Page:William Muir, Thomas Hunter Weir - The Caliphate; Its Rise, Decline, and Fall (1915).djvu/68



within a year of the death of the Prophet, the sway of Islām, which for a time had clean gone, was re-established throughout the Peninsula. The circle of victory was now complete. Begun, with the avenging expedition of Usāma in the north, it was followed up by Khālid's brilliant achievements in the east and centre of Arabia. But while in the "Garden of Death" the flower of the faithful were deciding the fate of Islām, then trembling in the balance, operations for a season languished elsewhere. Eventually, the campaign was carried vigorously over the other provinces, though in some quarters with limited resource and varying fortune; till, in the end, ʿIkrima sweeping down the eastern coast, and joined by Al-Muhājir in the south, stamped out as we have seen the last embers of apostasy.

The rebellion was suppressed, but the Arab tribes remained sullen and averse. The Bedawi, wont to wander wild and free over his pathless deserts, chafed at the demand of tithe, and spurned obedience to Medīna. Simply force and fear as yet attached him to the Caliph. The question occurs, what would have been the fortune of Islām had no great impulse arisen from without? The prospect was not encouraging. Convictions so shallow, and aspirations so low, as those of the Bedawīn would soon have disappeared; force and fear would not long have availed to hold together such disintegrated materials as go to form the Arab nation. The South was jealous of the North; Bedawīn of the desert 41